OrionX
I think aty will recover, but I don't know whether it's in the process of doing a 12->20->30 or 12->10->20 or 12->10->6->10->12->15.
My guess is that the next quarter's earnings should say something, though I'd say again that last quarter's earnings had all the signs of 'everything and the kitchen sink' to perhaps attribute future costs earlier while deferring recognition of revenue to the future (this next Q), it would be very hard to get a -ve quarter if that was what happened, however, if after all that, the earnings are still -ve, then some hard times are ahead.
The web sites do say that the radeon is a good chip, so it should get more of the shrinking desktop graphics pie, 6 months from now, the real competitor is not nvda, but the intel i815 and future product --- intel's graphics will eventually get to the stage where it's fast enough that noone really cares. Add to that the CPU+graphics integration and life will get pretty tough in this area. Give it 2 years, and my guess is that INTC will easily have 60% of graphics simply because it is fast enough.
Everyone sort of understands that the non-integrated PC desktop graphics days are numbered, and challenging intel's dominance there is not easy (outside of US, if you looked at the old i740 (a dismal failure) intel has some predatory business practices --- eg: bundling i740 and the MB chipset and a cpu together. If this was to extend to the integrated chipset+graphics,... )
If people want to fight it out with intel in the PC area, eventually, they're going to have to build an SOC integrated cpu+io+graphics, which is hard, this is why it seems the path of least resistance is to identify STB and game box opps as well. For gamebox strategy to succeed, the PS2 has to be a flop, and the dolphin has to take off. The game market is really Sony's to lose, the xbox will have an even harder time than the dolphin to beat the PS2. This is the betamax argument: there really is only room for one dominant player in the gamebox market, if there is a second player, the second player has to fight an uphill battle with perhaps some luck on their side (nintendo+pokemon) as sega,3DO,atari found out to their dismay.
I think based on all these, strategically, existing graphics players who still have not had significant revenue from new industries have some tough challenges ahead. Which is not to say they are doomed, but they have to be nimble and lucky.
SbH. |
